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The Pointlessness of Facebook’s New Emoticons

It took me all of five minutes to see just how pointless the emotion likes are going to be. Don’t get me wrong, I like the fact they exist. I intend to use them. BUT consider the following: You see someone forward a post that’s really stupid and factually inaccurate. Let’s say the headline is, “New Evidence Suggests Martians cause Autism”. You decide to use the Anger emotion on it.

Does that mean “How stupid are you for forwarding this, dumbass?” or does it mean “How dare those Martians give us Autism?” And in the end it’s still a like in terms of it causing the algorithm to make more people see it. An anger icon isn’t a negative response, because it could be for actual outrage on stories that deserve it, such as “Last Black Rhino Shot For Its Horn”

Then again…what if you post anger because you thought YOU had shot the last one and are angry someone else got it…you bastard.

And the same applies to the Facebook ads. Right now I’m seeing people using Anger on the stupid ads popping up in their feed, and my first thought was “Ha! Way to stick it to the ads!”

But that’s still a LIKE as far as Facebook is concerned… and smart advertisers will gear their ads to make the anger icons ambiguous anyway. So, “Get Superhero Themed Underwear Here” becomes “Marvel Doesn’t Want You to Get Your Hands on This Awesome Superhero Underwear” (anger now can be seen as “How dare those Marvel Douchebags keep me from those sweet Batman undies!”).

…er…not that superhero underwear has been in my feed for any reason… I mean, it’s not like I’m… that is…. DON’T JUDGE ME!

Point is, ultimately the emotions are going to be pointless… virtually a Rorschach test in which people will interpret the emotions based on their own perceptions.